Photo: The Lone Fir Spur Trail in the north end of the Sage Hills after it was bulldozed on October 24.

The Day the Lone Fir Trail Became the Lone Fir Road

It’s only through dumb luck, or perhaps through the good karma accrued by Neal Hedges, that the Lone Fir Spur, the three-year-old trail in northern part of the Sage Hills, did not get disfigured into a road. On the morning of October 24, Hedges, the Stewardship Director for the Chelan-Douglas Land Trust, happened to be working at the Horse Lake Reserve, owned by the Land Trust, when he saw the machinery. Checking it out, he ran into a small bulldozer, owned by the Chelan PUD, blading the Lone Fir trail into a dirt road.

Confused and distressed that a trail the Land Trust and its volunteers had spent a lot of resources building was being destroyed, Hedges rushed to find out what was taking place and attempted to stop the work. The ‘what’ of it all was quickly determined: A powerline tower a half mile to the south needed a new guy wire to support it so about 1.25 miles of trail was being bladed so a backhoe could access the tower. Hedges knew that an ambiguous easement for this property, allowed the PUD to ‘cross’ it to maintain its power lines, but did road building on their property constitute ‘crossing’?

Photo: Looking down the Lone Fir Spur toward the draw where the Homestead Trail branches off.

Hedges also wanted to know why the PUD hadn’t notified the Land Trust about this visit and its intent. The workers running the machinery were following orders but when they called for answers their supervisor instructed that they were to carry on with the bulldozing until he personally gave orders to stop.

Fortunately the bulldozer operator did stop while Hedges contacted others at the PUD who understood the big picture of what was taking place on the Land Trust’s property and how this complemented the PUD’s own wildlife agenda for the Sage Hills.

With the bulldozer at rest, Hedges discussed other alternatives for getting the job done. Why not take a smaller, lighter, tracked excavator (like a Bobcat) over land to the power pole? This would be quick, do minimal damage to ground cover, and would probably be cheaper. It also wouldn’t destroy a trail the Land Trust had spent a lot of grant money and several hundred volunteer hours constructing. Hedges showed the PUD where a small excavator could access its pole.

This alternative was successfully implemented the next day and the power tower got its maintenance through far less-invasive tactics. Thanks to Hedges, the PUD also got off the hook with a little poke to the eye rather than the public-relations black eye it would have received had its employees obliterated another mile of a popularly used trail on property it didn’t own.

What went wrong here? Communication. In this case, the land owner was never contacted to discuss the work that needed to take place nor to provide input on how to best accomplish that work. The need to contact the land owner was on the work order for the project, but the actual contact never took place. “Had we been notified, we could have discussed options and come up with a solution like the tracked excavator that fulfilled their needs and did minimal damage to our property,” said Hedges.

This could have been a much larger problem than the ‘oops’ it became, and the Chelan PUD would be wise to use that good fortune as an opportunity to analyze what went south with its procedures and chain of command. Among the division tasked with this work there was an absence of knowledge about the recreation and conservation values of the lands being impacted. There also seemed to be a reluctance at the supervisory level to deal with little problems (like a complaining landowner) getting in the way of getting the job done.

The Land Trust has been gracious about the faux pas and has maintained a ‘mistakes-happen’ attitude. WenatcheeOutdoors is a little more appalled. We recognize the Chelan PUD is economically and recreationally an important and a well-intentioned organization in this region. We also recognize in bureaucracies it is common for some divisions to be unaware of what other divisions are doing – a reality impacting this incident. Nonetheless, bulldozing a 1.25-mile scar across another landowner’s property without their approval, turning a trail that took considerable resources to build into a road without the input of the landowner, and having a supervisor brushing-off a representative of the landowner who was trying to ascertain what was taking place all highlight problems with procedures, policies, and attitudes that warrant self-analysis.

Hikers and mountain bikers will encounter the damaged portion of trail about a half mile from the Horse Lake Trailhead as they follow the trail south toward the new Homestead Trail.

Currently about a quarter mile of trail has been damaged. All grade reversals and outsloping of the trail to prevent erosion issues have been eliminated.

The Land Trust (hopefully with help from the PUD) will reshape and reseed this section of trail in the weeks ahead. This will allow the surface of the trail to set up over the winter and will knock back some of the noxious weeds that are sure to sprout in the disturbed soil next spring.

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I think those are my footprints in the third photo. Parts off the trail should be off limits to wheeled and horse traffic for a while it would seem. Parts of the trail bed where not disturbed where they blade, in other parts is is completely gone.

Good work Neal. Hopefully this story gets to the Wenatchee World. While we all make mistakes and these things "happen", if the public becomes aware of what went on, this sort of stuff will be less likely to happen again.

" their supervisor instructed that they were to carry on with the bulldozing until he personally gave orders to stop."

Who said this? If so, outrageous and out of control self-importance! PUD is owned by the people, but a Supervisor is this imperious? He cannot even delay his bulldozer-trespass to discover the depth of his failure?

If this is so, PUD is far on the wrong side of serving the public, dragged headlong into casual contempt of the public by this Supervisor! (?)

Freeman Keller wrote: "We rode that last night and I commented to the others on two ironies. One, it looked like Matt's little Kubota was out there to repair the damage, and two, I remember when Matt and Randy and the rest were laying out that trail. One of them said to me 'we never destroy a sage bush if we don't have to - some of them are a hundred years old'. The PUD blasted right thru a thousand years of sage."

Colin Brine wrote: “ Thanks for looking into this. We rode this yesterday and it was very difficult and slightly hazardous to ride. Had no idea why it was torn up like that and appreciate knowing what happened... Hopefully this will be a good lesson for everyone about good communication. The best opportunities to build relationships often occur in recovery situations. This looks like one of those opportunities to build on."

Meanwhile, Bob Parlette joked, "This is a fine road. Now we can finally get a ski groomer on the Lone Fir Spur and enjoy XC skiing there."

Patrick Walker, Former Trails Coordinator for the Land Trust, sent us this note:
"That section of trail was just getting to the point of naturalization too, where it really was starting to look like part of the landscape again.
This isn’t the first time PUD has used the trail as they please. I caught them another time driving a Gator down the trail to the trailhead. The Gator was wider than the trail so the vehicle was flattening sage on both sides as it went down and nearly smashing plants that were just planted next to the memorial trail marker! I confronted the operators and they were like 'sorry dude we didn’t know this was a trail.' I sent a formal complaint to the supervisor at the time."

There's a skilled operator doing a pretty good job repairing the damage right now. Should be done tomorrow. We'll have to do a lot of polishing up in the spring, and hopefully the winter moisture will come gently, but considering what it would have looked like if Neal hadn't been there, I think we'll be alright!

Hi, my name is Kirk Hudson, managing director of Generation & Transmission at the Chelan County PUD. We recognize this was a significant impact to the trail, and I would like to assure everyone that we are coordinating closely with the Chelan-Douglas Land Trust on restoration. The PUD is a strong advocate for natural resources, as evidenced by numerous parks, fish and wildlife, and natural resource projects throughout North Central Washington, and we regret what happened here. We are following up to determine how we can prevent similar situations in the future.

Such a bummer! I was up on the Horse Lake Reserve when this was happening. I'm so glad Neal was there to handle the situation and stop the damage taking place. He is an incredible ambassador for the CDLT and dealt with the misunderstanding with far more grace than most of us could have mustered. The workers were most likely just focused on the tast at hand, but hopefully this opened their eyes and the eyes of other PUD workers to pay attention to the land around them and look for less damaging options.

While we all know that trails are nice and people enjoy the recreational opprotunities presented, it seems that a lot of people would rather have trails than power. Dosent anybody realize the kind of equipment it takes to replace an entire structure? And yes, that day will come. Maybe people will allow a road if you just turn theyre power off for a while. This is a big part of whats wrong with our country. WOW!

Andy Kahn and I were on the trail Friday morning with a PUD project supervisor. The PUD's work crew is doing a good job repairing the trail with a small excavator and hand tools. We will need to do more work next spring but not as much as we originally thought. To the PUD's credit, they have stepped up quickly without excuses to repair the damage. Next up, spreading and raking in native grass seed before the trail closes.

As I agree with some of the comments. I also remember a time several years ago when a severe wind storm came relentlessly through chelan county cutting power to thousands. I was without power for almost 3 days. I can only hope the PUD can do what ever it takes to improve the reliability of THEIR power system. Thank you for keeping the lights on!